


Press "A" to Punch

by bluejayblueskies



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Fist Fights, Hunt Avatar Alice "Daisy" Tonner, I write the Jon/Melanie and Jon/Daisy friendships I want to see in the world, Light Angst, Little bit of angst, M/M, alcohol mention, but like... non-violently, manlet rights to punch other avatars in the face, spoilers through mag162
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-22
Updated: 2020-07-22
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:15:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,283
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25425250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluejayblueskies/pseuds/bluejayblueskies
Summary: Jon's tired of being a supernatural punching bag, so he decides to learn how to punch back. It goes about how you'd expect.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Comments: 4
Kudos: 109
Collections: The Magnus Archives Flash Fanwork Challenge





	Press "A" to Punch

**Author's Note:**

> This is the week one work for the Magnus Archives Mailday Flash Fanwork challenge! More information on the challenge can be found [here](https://magnus-mailday.dreamwidth.org/)

“Are you ready?”

Jon rocks back and forth on the balls of his feet; his hands are slick with a nervous sweat. “Yes.” _Liar._

Melanie frowns at him, clearly not believing him. “Are you sure? You look—“

“Yes, yes, just do it!”

Melanie doesn’t need to be told twice, apparently. Her fist swings toward Jon’s face, and he barely manages to hold in a yelp as he ducks to the side, her knuckles narrowly avoiding the skin of his cheek. “Okay, so maybe—“ He does yelp this time as another fist swings toward him, and he manages to block this one like he’s been taught, only for an elbow to catch him in the ribs, leaving him gasping for air.

“I thought you said you were ready,” Melanie says, fighting back a smile.

“You know,” Jon says, once he’s gotten some of his breath back, “I get the feeling that you just wanted to hit me.”

Melanie shrugs. “Maybe. But the idea _was_ that you would block. You know, like we’ve been training to do?”

“It’s not for lack of effort,” Jon grumbles, poking his ribs delicately. That’ll bruise… probably. “I’m not much of a… _naturally skilled_ fighter.”

“Yeah—that’s why we’re _training_.” Melanie puts her hands, curled into fists, in front of her face. “Again. Remember not to leave yourself open after you block.”

A few more jabs in the ribs, and Jon collapses onto Georgie’s threadbare couch, trying not to wince with every breath he takes. Melanie sits cross-legged on the floor in front of him, starting to unwrap her knuckles. “I’m not trying to hurt you, you know,” she says off-hand, letting the soft fabric pool on the floor next to her.

“I know.” Jon sighs, leaving his own hands wrapped; it’s not like he even got in one punch, anyway, and he wants to keep going until he does. “I asked you to train me to defend myself. I didn’t ask you to hold back.” A pause. “They’re not going to hold back. They… they didn’t hold back.”

Melanie’s quiet, her brow creased in something that might be sympathy, but could just as easily be mild frustration. “Do you really think being able to throw a punch would have helped you? Hard to fight back when you’re tied to a chair.”

Reflexively, Jon rubs his wrists, like he can still feel the ropes tied tight, rubbing his skin raw. “I don’t know. Probably not. I just… I just think knowing that I had the option—it would have helped.” He chuckles, but there’s no humor behind it. “It probably would have hurt me more than them; I can’t imagine plastic has much… _give_.”

“Well, punching a human hurts too.” A corner of Melanie’s mouth quirks up. “Not like you’d know, Mr. _Help-me-Melanie-I’ve-never-been-in-a-fight-in-my-life-and-now-evil-things-are-out-to-get-me-and-I-intend-to-engage-them-in-hand-to-hand-combat._ ”

“Ha ha.” Jon stands, wincing; Melanie raises an eyebrow, but says nothing. “Again?”

“Jon—“

“ _Again?_ ” He… he doesn’t have much time, before he has to leave again, and somehow, this feels like the last chance he’ll get for a while.

Melanie sighs, beginning the process of rewrapping her hands. “Yeah, all right. Again.”

* * *

It takes a while, after the coma, to get the opportunity to train again. He’s… preoccupied, and Melanie can’t be in the same room as him without trying to stab him, even after the bullet is out, so his options are limited. It’s only after he crawls out of the Buried, Daisy in tow, that he finally feels like he has someone to ask.

Daisy squints at him when he mentions it, like she thinks he might be joking. “O- only if you’re comfortable with it!” he hastens to say, feeling a little ridiculous himself. “If it’s too close to the Hunt, I understand—“

“Nah,” she says. “That’s different. No chase, no Hunt. Just didn’t think that was something you’d be interested in, that’s all.”

“Well, after I was- uh- kidnapped, by the Stranger, I started training with Melanie, but now—“

“She hates your guts,” Basira pipes in from the corner, where she’s slowly working through a teetering stack of books. “Would have thought that would make the training more… _realistic_.”

“Yes, thank you Basira. There are already plenty of things trying to _actually_ kill me, and I would prefer to keep the life-or-death experiences to a minimum.”

“Anyway,” Daisy says, and Jon turns to see that she’s shrugged off her jacket; it’s a little too cold for a tank top, he thinks, but she doesn’t seem to notice. “I wouldn’t mind an opportunity to get my arms back in shape. Let’s see what you’ve got.”

What Jon’s _got_ , it seems, is not a lot. Once, he gets a flash of Knowing, and he manages to duck one of Daisy’s right hooks and land a solid punch to her stomach; she barely flinches, and her next punch catches him right in the ribs—or, rather, lack thereof. “Oh,” he says, stunned, and then he staggers back, his desperate grip on the closest shelf the only thing keeping him from sinking to the ground. “ _Oh_ , that hurt.”

“Hm.” Daisy cracks her knuckles, which despite being wrapped still hurt very, very much when they made contact with his spleen. “Maybe I should be giving Melanie lessons too. Or, maybe you just suck.”

Jon manages a glare. “I’m _out of practice._ I’ve been a little busy lately.”

“Oh, with what?” Basira says, her tone clipped. “More weird monster stuff?” It’s not as cutting as it has been, since Daisy got back, and Jon supposes he’s thankful for that, at least. “Anyway, can’t you just Know how to fight now?”

“You know I can’t control that.” Jon sucks a breath through his teeth. “Besides… even if I could, just Know, I think it’s better to do it this way. It feels… more tactile. More real. It’s something I _can_ control.”

Daisy hums. “I suppose.”

“Besides, I can’t really protect myself from someone by just Knowing things about them.” A thought crosses his mind, unbidden, and not entirely his: _Not yet, at least_. He doesn’t really know what that means. He doesn’t really think he wants to.

Daisy hums again, this time in amusement. “Another round, then?”

Jon takes a deep breath; it only hurts a little. He’s certainly had worse. “Don’t go easy on me.”

Something in Daisy’s eyes glitters. “Oh, I won’t.”

* * *

Jon’s lying on the floor of the cabin. The tape recorder next to him spins and spins and spins; Jon doesn’t know what it thinks it’s going to hear. The tape in it finished playing hours ago, and he wants to press play again, to hear their voices, to remind himself again and again and again of what he’s lost—the loss _he’s_ caused—but he’s just. Tired.

“Hey,” Martin says, softly, and he settles on the floor next to Jon; there’s a mug in his hand, and Jon Knows it’s empty, but he sits up and takes it from Martin anyway, giving him a weary smile in return. “Are you still…?”

“Yeah,” Jon says; he glances away from Martin, staring at the wall, the ceiling, carefully avoiding the window, even though he can feel his eyes drawn to it, like a moth to a flame. It’s calling to him, and he’s not sure how much longer he can stay away. He’s not sure how much longer he _wants_ to stay away.

Jon blinks, hard, and forces his eyes back to Martin. He needs to get out of his head—as impossible as that is now—and he sets the mug on the ground next to him, taking Martin’s hand instead and pulling him up with him. “Martin,” he says, focusing on the feel of Martin’s skin beneath his fingers, grounding him. “Do you… have you ever punched anyone?”

“Uh.” Martin blinks, staring at Jon like he’s not sure he’s heard him right. “N- no, I haven’t. I’m not really the kind of person to engage in a physical confrontation, you know?” He suddenly looks nervous. “Why? Did- did something happen?”

“No,” Jon says quickly, squeezing Martin’s hand. “No, it’s… well, it’s not fine, but you know. It’s the same as it has been.” He pauses, considering. Then: “Would you like to learn how?”

“I…” Martin frowns, unsure. “I suppose? I can certainly think of a few people who I wouldn’t mind punching, now that you mention it.” He looks at Jon, suddenly curious. “Wait, have _you_ ever punched anyone?”

“Not- not in a real fight, no, but I used to train with Melanie, and then Daisy. Since more things were coming after me, I wanted to be able to protect myself.” He laughs, a little. “Seems a bit arbitrary now, but it was… nice, you know? To feel like I had some control.” He worries his bottom lip between his teeth. “Maybe, if I’d just been a bit stronger…”

“Nope, no.” Martin places a gentle, but firm, hand on Jon’s cheek, angling his head so their eyes meet. “I know you still won’t believe me, but I’m going to keep saying it until you do: this is _not your fault_. Being able to—what, punch one of the avatars in the face?—wasn’t going to stop Elias from getting what he wanted.”

Jon pushes his protests to the back of his mind and opts instead for a forced smile. “Would have felt good though. _Really_ good.”

“You know what?” Martin releases his hold on Jon, stepping back with a determined grin. “Yeah, I think I _would_ like to learn. That way, when I see Elias’s face again, I can put my fist through his stupid, cocky grin.” He pauses in thought. “Hm. Guess I’ve wanted to do that for a long time, actually. Maybe I _am_ a bit confrontational.”

They tear strips from an old blanket to wrap their knuckles—“Believe me, Martin, it hurts way more if you don’t wrap your hands, for you and the person you’re hitting”—and then, standing in the open living room, couches pushed against the wall, Jon guides Martin’s fist into the correct position. “If you tuck your thumb beneath your fingers, it’ll break when you make contact, so make sure it’s on the outside,” he says, and Martin nods, moving his thumb to the correct position. It feels a little strange—to be the trainer instead of the trainee—but the way Martin is smiling, and asking questions that Jon somehow Knows the answers to, makes the discomfort bleed away almost entirely. Soon, Jon is guiding Martin through basic punches and blocks, and his fingers linger on Martin’s skin as he fixes his form, which makes Martin smile and chide him to, “Stay focused, Jon.”

They move through a few forms; Jon moves his arm in a slow approximation of a punch, and Martin blocks, and Jon makes adjustments, and then they switch. It’s nice, routine, and it brings him back to nights spent in the archives, sparring with Daisy while Basira burned through book after book—or, later on, gave play-by-play commentary. They’d take breaks and pass a bottle of whiskey around, which meant they could usually only take a few breaks before Jon was swaying on his feet. “Honestly, you have the tolerance of a teenager,” Daisy would say, and his already-flushed cheeks would burn hotter as he sputtered out protests that clearly had no effect. It was a distraction, something to look forward to, a light in the dark. It kept his mind off everything else—the growing unease in the archives during the day, his gnawing hunger and desire for _more, more_ , the hole Martin had left that seemed to eat away at more of him each day. It was… nice.

And now it’s gone. And it’s all his fault.

Vaguely, Jon realizes that Martin’s saying his name. He blinks, dragging himself back into the cabin, and sees Martin standing very close, his hands on both of Jon’s shoulders. “Jon! Hey, come back to me.”

“Sorry,” Jon says, his voice scratchy. With a start, he realizes he’s crying. “Sorry,” he repeats, softer. “I… got lost in myself, for a bit.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Jon hesitates. “We haven’t finished… you still haven’t thrown a real punch.”

“Well, I think I’ve got the technique down solidly enough.” Martin smiles at that, but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. Jon knows that’s his fault, as well. But at least that, he can do something about.

“I suppose I can’t convince you to try to _actually_ punch me?” he says lightly, and Martin chuckles. This time, it does reach his eyes.

“I’m not going to punch you, Jon.”

“I did say _try_.” Jon’s lips twist into a wry smile. “I do Know everything, after all—I could easily block you.”

“Oh, okay, now you’re trying to _goad_ me into punching you. Well, it’s not going to work. The training session is _officially_ over.”

“Yes, yes, all right.” Jon places a hand on one of Martin’s, still on his shoulder; then, he leans in, wrapping his arms around Martin’s lower back, letting his head nestle just beneath Martin’s chin. He can feel Martin sigh against him, his arms settling against Jon’s middle back. They don’t say anything, for a moment; in the silence, the cabin creeks. Then, Jon murmurs, “Daisy would have punched me,” and Martin seems to understand what Jon really means. His lips press softly against the top of Jon’s head.

“We’ll see them soon,” Martin promises, and Jon tries not to Know whether he’s right or not. He really tries.

“Yeah,” Jon says. His hands grip the back of Martin’s jumper tightly, and he sighs. “Yeah, I’m sure we will.”


End file.
